Goodness, it has been another year. This year I started a Patreon, and for a small-time gaming blog, it does incredibly well thanks to the generosity of friends and readers. Blog traffic both here and over at Tribality bounced back after a fairly dismal 2018, likely the result of the massive growth of D&D fandom and those fans starting to look for other ways to engage.

Posting has slowed down to two per month here, and I feel bad about that – but that’s happening because of good things. That time has instead gone to (taking care of two small children and) paid writing projects, including Reign: Realities, Talisman Fantasy Adventures, and Seas of Vodari. This time last year, I said I wanted to pivot to adventure writing; that’s still a goal rather than an accomplishment.

I’ve also started the Edition Wars podcast with my excellent co-host, Sam Dillon, as part of the Tome Show, and I’ve been invited to contribute to another Tome Show ongoing series. I’m excited to see what the next year might bring.

Games I’m Running

1. Aurikesh: Seven years, 99 sessions. Some long-time players moved at the end of 2018, so while the game has never had a stable roster, the most common roster changed substantially.
2. I failed to run even five minutes of Ars Magica in 2019. Alas.
3. We’re planning a 3-year reunion event of Dust to Dust in January, so I’m back to having LARP staff meetings.
4. (Don’t tell anyone, but I have a one-shot LARP in mind that I want to write and run. We’ll see if I have the time and energy to make that happen.)

Games I’m Playing

1. Altera Awakens has finished its second full season. I’m still enjoying my character, the Archmage Cinna Satyavarha.
2. Kainenchen’s Liel campaign has had a particularly difficult time scheduling sessions this year – we’ve played twice in 2019.
3. Kainenchen ran a session of Over the Edge (25A) at GenCon that I got to play! It was my first time encountering Al Amarja as a player.
4. Kainenchen is working on a game currently titled At What Cost?, and I got to play in two sessions of it at Metatopia.
5. I had to take a six-month break from the Fate Core space opera game, but I’ve rejoined it… though that game hasn’t run since I rejoined, for scheduling reasons.
6. I also joined a 13^th Age Arabian Nights campaign, where I’m playing Omar al-Asmari, a human wizard (he’s a lot like Mulissu from Sepulchrave’s Tales of Wyre, but earth-based rather than air-based).
7. I’m playing Warriors of Waterdeep on my phone. I should find some time to blog about this game; it’s a mental time-waster and I’ve put wildly more money into it (any) than it really deserves. As often as not, I actively dislike the game, but keep playing it. That’s more common in my experience of mobile games than I prefer to admit.
8. I’m occasionally playing Hollow Knight on the Xbox One. It’s very good.
9. I’m occasionally playing Planescape: Torment Enhanced Edition on my Surface. The Enhanced Edition fixes a lot of the miserable UI of the original, so (given that I’m not invested in cutting-edge graphics and I can tolerate 2e rules), it remains one of the greatest video games ever released.
10. I’m occasionally playing Moonlighter on the Xbox One. Also great.
11. We just went to Metatopia, so I got to playtest a bunch of stuff that is an unstated amount of time from release. AlderQuest, at least, is coming to Kickstarter on the 19^th of November. If I hear about Kickstarters for my other favorite games of the con, I definitely plan to promote them.
12. I played Codenames for the first time a few weeks back. Great game, do recommend.
13. I played Carcassonne for the first time that same evening. I had a great time because of the company I was in; I assume I would enjoy it with other people.

Games I’m Observing

1. I’m still listening to Critical Role, and I’m currently on to Episode 13 of the Mighty Nein campaign.
2. How We Roll Podcast
3. The World Tree Burns
4. Court of Swords

I dropped Dice, Camera, Action following That Scandal.

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